one of the biggest announcements from Historicon was that Hubert Cater of Fury Software has signed Strategic Command 3 with us. We're very excited to get the chance to work with Hubert and here are the notes for his presentation from the event. Hubert's presentation was obviously a lot more exciting than this but it gives a feel for the discussion topics at the event!

Korean War 1950-51 ....– Existing Key features ........ • Decision Events ........ • Diplomatic repercussions from events ........ • National Morale and how it can be affected by events ........ • The ability for new countries to be formed, borders adjusted, and for armistices to be signed ........ • Research and technology ........ • Convoy systems

• Key new features For Strategic Command 3 .... – Dynamic movement and combined attacks .... – Oil and manpower .... – Improved naval system and supply rules .... – more fog of war .... – Expanded unit types, terrain and resources .... – New look and feel including over 300 new 3d unit models .... – Use of the Slitherine PBEM++ server for asynchronous multiplayer

• Additional features for Strategic Command 3 .... – Scorecard .... – Game replays .... – Unit training at production time .... – Supply by sea including mulberry harbours .... – AI Controlled majors and switching sides .... – Expanded handicap settings for both AI and Multiplayer games .... – Resign Option to end a game early with a result .... – New Amphibious Mechanism allowing troops to convert from Transports to Amphibious Transports .... – Introduction of Buttons that players can press to trigger events: ........ • Nuclear Weapons ........ • Unrestricted naval warfare ........ • Partisan uprisings to take place in conjunction with DDay

Korean War 1950-51 ....– Existing Key features ........ • Decision Events ........ • Diplomatic repercussions from events ........ • National Morale and how it can be affected by events ........ • The ability for new countries to be formed, borders adjusted, and for armistices to be signed ........ • Research and technology ........ • Convoy systems

Is that part of a previous SC2 or will it be in SC3 along with European Theater?

Hello everyone, I just wanted to quickly pop in and say hi and thanks to Iain for posting the above

To answer some of the questions these are highlights from my presentation and of course this does not include all the notes or details that were discussed at Historicon.

Also, just to confirm, any mention of Key Features or New Features above will all be a part of SC3. There will also be much more that can only be described once we break down some of the details on the New Features but again these are just some of the highlights and not an all inclusive list.

The notes on some of the previous releases and campaigns, including user submitted mods were part of the discussion on just how flexible the SC engine has become and this flexibility will definitely be retained for SC3.

I hope this helps and we look forward to sharing more once we are a bit further along in development

I'm surprised but stoked to see this happen. Hubert not only designs great games, but supports them and is very open to listening to the users of his game. I've been eagerly awaiting SC3, and can't want to see what it's going to look like when all is said and done!

Hello everyone, I just wanted to quickly pop in and say hi and thanks to Iain for posting the above

To answer some of the questions these are highlights from my presentation and of course this does not include all the notes or details that were discussed at Historicon.

Also, just to confirm, any mention of Key Features or New Features above will all be a part of SC3. There will also be much more that can only be described once we break down some of the details on the New Features but again these are just some of the highlights and not an all inclusive list.

The notes on some of the previous releases and campaigns, including user submitted mods were part of the discussion on just how flexible the SC engine has become and this flexibility will definitely be retained for SC3.

I hope this helps and we look forward to sharing more once we are a bit further along in development

Hubert

Hi Hubert, thanks for posting here! If anybody here doesn't know SC devs, Hubert is a great, open and communicative person, very responsive to players' feedback :) this is a great gain for Matrix/Slitherine :)

_____________________________

"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." - G.B. Shaw

EDIT: Oh noow I get it! The "Korea" is supposed to be part of the "user submitted mods". Now it all makes sense.

As I wrote already in the SC forums at battlefront, I hope that SC3 will get rid of the minor nations and make all nations independent with their own morale, tech and production. I really liked that about Commander:TgW

Wow! What a surprise! Wonder how Battlefront is taking this news? Ive got to say I have enjoyed Strategic Command since SC1 days. Between SC2 and PzC I am getting a healthy, happy dose of beer and pretzels gaming. Hubert has always to my knowledge been a very assessable and patient dev answering several of my questions in the past about SC and SC2 at Battlefront. Let me extend a warm welcome to Hubert here at Matrix and Slitherine.

Wow! What a surprise! Wonder how Battlefront is taking this news? Ive got to say I have enjoyed Strategic Command since SC1 days. Between SC2 and PzC I am getting a healthy, happy dose of beer and pretzels gaming. Hubert has always to my knowledge been a very assessable and patient dev answering several of my questions in the past about SC and SC2 at Battlefront. Let me extend a warm welcome to Hubert here at Matrix and Slitherine.

Ditto here, thoroughly enjoyed SC I and II. Hubert (and most mods/devs there as well) has been indeed patiently answering every and any question over at the Battlefront forum, I have yet to see a problem go unnoticed there so their support is outstanding. I do wonder however what will happen with Fury's DRM system??

Wow! What a surprise! Wonder how Battlefront is taking this news? Ive got to say I have enjoyed Strategic Command since SC1 days. Between SC2 and PzC I am getting a healthy, happy dose of beer and pretzels gaming. Hubert has always to my knowledge been a very assessable and patient dev answering several of my questions in the past about SC and SC2 at Battlefront. Let me extend a warm welcome to Hubert here at Matrix and Slitherine.

Ditto here, thoroughly enjoyed SC I and II. Hubert (and most mods/devs there as well) has been indeed patiently answering every and any question over at the Battlefront forum, I have yet to see a problem go unnoticed there so their support is outstanding. I do wonder however what will happen with Fury's DRM system??

I have no official capacity beyond ability to know what has been the case in previous instances.

When you come to Slitherine Group, it is generally done the Slitherine Group way.

I recall seeing Slitherine incorporate some of the ways of Matrix Games, and I recall Matrix Games gaining access to the perks of Slitherine's ways as well.

Slitherine Goup to me, means DRM = a serial and nothing else. Slitherine Group means to me, multiplayer service second to none.

I don't care if SC2 stays over at Battlefront though. Regardless of whether the release was yesterday or not, I have no personal interest in SC2 as it uses those ugly tiles. The DRM it has has not helped, but it wasn't the reason I don't have it.

I am expecting to call SC3 as SC1 Advanced. SC2 is something that never happened.

Wow! What a surprise! Wonder how Battlefront is taking this news? Ive got to say I have enjoyed Strategic Command since SC1 days. Between SC2 and PzC I am getting a healthy, happy dose of beer and pretzels gaming. Hubert has always to my knowledge been a very assessable and patient dev answering several of my questions in the past about SC and SC2 at Battlefront. Let me extend a warm welcome to Hubert here at Matrix and Slitherine.

Ditto here, thoroughly enjoyed SC I and II. Hubert (and most mods/devs there as well) has been indeed patiently answering every and any question over at the Battlefront forum, I have yet to see a problem go unnoticed there so their support is outstanding. I do wonder however what will happen with Fury's DRM system??

I have no official capacity beyond ability to know what has been the case in previous instances.

When you come to Slitherine Group, it is generally done the Slitherine Group way.

I recall seeing Slitherine incorporate some of the ways of Matrix Games, and I recall Matrix Games gaining access to the perks of Slitherine's ways as well.

Slitherine Goup to me, means DRM = a serial and nothing else. Slitherine Group means to me, multiplayer service second to none.

I don't care if SC2 stays over at Battlefront though. Regardless of whether the release was yesterday or not, I have no personal interest in SC2 as it uses those ugly tiles. The DRM it has has not helped, but it wasn't the reason I don't have it.

I am expecting to call SC3 as SC1 Advanced. SC2 is something that never happened.

Actually SC2 is a really good game, it has one of the best AIs I've ever seen. The tiles were annoying at first, but after a while you don't mind :) The game was good enough to make me buy its 4 expansions, until battlefront decided to block my IP without any reason (i.e. saying that somebody spammed their forum from a similar IP). Fury coming to Slitherine is a great move, I think the DRM was battlefront's idea, though of course I'm just speculating.

_____________________________

"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." - G.B. Shaw

Nothing personal, but, saying an AI is any good, never means anything to me.

There are ways to make games challenging, but, in the end, the AI is always a let down.

We have no reason to think the Matrix or Terminator or Dune is about to happen in the real world.

Computers don't think, they just do really fast.

It's like saying my blender is smart because it can whip batter faster than me :)

I have found Civilization to be challenging, but that is really a reflection of detail over load. The machine never needs to remember details. I have found myself challenged in Battle Academy, but usually that is only on the first play through of a scenario. On the second run all the surprises are gone.

Most wargames can generally trip you up at least once. After that, the only challenge is beating another human.

Nothing personal, but, saying an AI is any good, never means anything to me.

There are ways to make games challenging, but, in the end, the AI is always a let down.

We have no reason to think the Matrix or Terminator or Dune is about to happen in the real world.

Computers don't think, they just do really fast.

It's like saying my blender is smart because it can whip batter faster than me :)

I have found Civilization to be challenging, but that is really a reflection of detail over load. The machine never needs to remember details. I have found myself challenged in Battle Academy, but usually that is only on the first play through of a scenario. On the second run all the surprises are gone.

Most wargames can generally trip you up at least once. After that, the only challenge is beating another human.

In most games AI is a let down. In some it isn't (massive assault comes to mind, a game where devs had to add a lower difficulty in a patch as most players weren't able to beat the AI on any difficulty provided). SC2 is one of the examples of how AI can be challenging, I played the game hundreds of times, and playing on the highest difficulty I could say the win ratio for me is 50%. Civilisation's AI doesn't come anywhere near.

I do hope SC3 will have even better AI as most of the time I cannot be bothered with MP, sure, it can be challenging but having to wait for the next turn or having to devote some fixed time to a session is something I can't accept. With AI I can play whenever I want and however much I want and thus, for me, this is the most important factor. If I want MP I play board games :)

_____________________________

"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." - G.B. Shaw

Well I suppose if the AI element of SC2 has some respect, then it likely will translate over to SC3.

I've known games that were near perfection as designs, just so long as it was player vs player.

The nearly iron solid Steel Panthers for instance, the Long Campaign is deadly dull as the AI is totally helpless. The Mega Campaigns are about the only portion of the experience I ever enjoyed. But the player was unable to cherry pick perfect formations of killer combos the AI could never deal with.

Whenever a game is a buy your force design, the AIs always get trashed.

In Civ V, I actually find it odd when lose, but vs another human, it is generally hard to win. My favourite way to play, is myself, the other human vs all the other civs as teams. 2 vs groups of 3-4 is very challenging.

The hardest part of designing a historical simulation, is simulating historical idiotic political decisions. Hitler never should have lost that war. That he did, is because he sucked as a soldier. The man was only good at talking. But how do you simulate random insane decisions? Although I suppose, that is sometimes what the AI actually does I guess.

Not taking Malta cost Germany the war. Then there was throwing away the 6th army. And thinking the world of Patton and not being able to realize that the Allies played by rules they didn't. Rommel smacking a soldier would not put his career in danger. The allies cheating via code breaking successes. Midway should never have happened. Not easy to program the crap of the real war.

Well I suppose if the AI element of SC2 has some respect, then it likely will translate over to SC3.

I've known games that were near perfection as designs, just so long as it was player vs player.

The nearly iron solid Steel Panthers for instance, the Long Campaign is deadly dull as the AI is totally helpless. The Mega Campaigns are about the only portion of the experience I ever enjoyed. But the player was unable to cherry pick perfect formations of killer combos the AI could never deal with.

Whenever a game is a buy your force design, the AIs always get trashed.

In Civ V, I actually find it odd when lose, but vs another human, it is generally hard to win. My favourite way to play, is myself, the other human vs all the other civs as teams. 2 vs groups of 3-4 is very challenging.

The hardest part of designing a historical simulation, is simulating historical idiotic political decisions. Hitler never should have lost that war. That he did, is because he sucked as a soldier. The man was only good at talking. But how do you simulate random insane decisions? Although I suppose, that is sometimes what the AI actually does I guess.

Not taking Malta cost Germany the war. Then there was throwing away the 6th army. And thinking the world of Patton and not being able to realize that the Allies played by rules they didn't. Rommel smacking a soldier would not put his career in danger. The allies cheating via code breaking successes. Midway should never have happened. Not easy to program the crap of the real war.

I don't want to stir up a lengthy discussion, but I'd say Germany couldn't have won the war, no matter what. They simply outproduced and had too little manpower. Of course a different Germany, which would actually take in the populace of places like Ukraine maybe could have stand a chance, but that's too theoretical, this Germany never existed and if it had maybe it wouldn't have started the war

_____________________________

"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." - G.B. Shaw

The hardest part of designing a historical simulation, is simulating historical idiotic political decisions. Hitler never should have lost that war. That he did, is because he sucked as a soldier. The man was only good at talking. But how do you simulate random insane decisions? Although I suppose, that is sometimes what the AI actually does I guess.

Not taking Malta cost Germany the war. Then there was throwing away the 6th army. And thinking the world of Patton and not being able to realize that the Allies played by rules they didn't. Rommel smacking a soldier would not put his career in danger. The allies cheating via code breaking successes. Midway should never have happened. Not easy to program the crap of the real war.

Historians like Glantz and others have looked into this and what if:s numerous times and to minimize a large scale conflict into errors by Hitler is wrong. In war mistakes are done all the time, the allies probably made much more mistakes not to mention soviet unions disastrous campaign of 1941. To say that had Hitler done this or that then Germany would have won does not take into account that for every move the opponent will do a countermove.

Reason allies won is simply that they outproduced Germany in a war of attrition. That gives more room for errors too.

Kuni and Borsook, sorry boys those replies might fly in some lame university course, but they fail the test of time or in other words, they sound good today, but back then the world was different.

Yes the allies made some errors, rather big ones some times. But when the game is already defacto won, it isn't significant if you screw up the perfect ending.

Take for example the American disinterest in funnies on D-day, it came close to seriously damaging the fight. If Omaha had failed, it might have badly damaged chances for success. But here's the thing, Germany was already screwed in 44, so no matter how badly the Allies might mangled D-day, the Russians were still coming. It might have changed post war Europe, but Germany was done.

The war was decided in 41-42. Everything after that was a game that was already lost, and it was just about seeing how long the Germans and the Japanese could hold out.

Hitler's incredible successes, against a foe still fighting WW1, and against politicians spending all their time trying to avoid WW1 the rerun, were in so many cases not about military genius, but about a man that knew how to use words well. But he was a useless soldier, and he actually thought otherwise based on his early easy successes based on an opponent that was too uninterested to fight all out.

His biggest victories occurred BEFORE he attacked Poland. And they all worked to inflate his ego beyond his real worth. His generals caved in and started to believe him too.

I've played too many games of what if, where it was just a cold impersonal what if devoid of anything 'human' in the picture. What if Germany attacks Russia immediately. What if Germany doesn't attack Russia at all. What if Germany refuses to attack till Germany is attacked first instead. What if Germany single mindedly attacks the the Mediterranean first. What if Germany assault France right at the beginning.

But those all require a game design, where the player is free to place all the available military resources as seen fit. Advanced Third Reich will permit this, but I can't think of any computer wargames at this moment that do. Limitations of selling a program that is fixed.

I have played games, where the player is given forces and a set up area and the placement is entirely the whim of the player. But these are usually tactical games. I'd love to try that with grand strategy. If they made SC3 like that, and made it essentially a Advanced Third Reich like experience, I'd drop 100 bucks on it in a heart beat.

I have World in Flames, nice board game, not the equal of my Advanced Third Reich (my opinion). I have also seen the once upon a time computer version of World in Flames. I presume it has evolved a lot. I'd rather they rebuild the old Third Reich pc game and make it computer Advanced Third Reich. Granted, I have no idea who owns that game, but I would just call it SC3 and shamelessly make it an A3R clone.

The thing with simulating history, is you can't copy-write history. The units were where they were.

There will always be flights of fantasy that could have never been of course. Sealion is only good for long thread arguments and landing off the shores of the USA is even sillier. I generally won't waste my time playing any game that promotes that foolishness.

The Germans would not have needed to invade North America.

_____________________________

I have too many too complicated wargames, and not enough sufficiently interested non wargamer friends.

Hitler's incredible successes, against a foe still fighting WW1, and against politicians spending all their time trying to avoid WW1 the rerun, were in so many cases not about military genius, but about a man that knew how to use words well. But he was a useless soldier, and he actually thought otherwise based on his early easy successes based on an opponent that was too uninterested to fight all out.

His biggest victories occurred BEFORE he attacked Poland. And they all worked to inflate his ego beyond his real worth. His generals caved in and started to believe him too.

You don't happen to be an old German general, blaming it all on Hitler?

Re SC3, I'm definitely interested.

_____________________________

Jyri

The eternal privilege of those who never act themselves: to interrogate, be dissatisfied, find fault.

Kuni and Borsook, sorry boys those replies might fly in some lame university course, but they fail the test of time or in other words, they sound good today, but back then the world was different.

Yes the allies made some errors, rather big ones some times. But when the game is already defacto won, it isn't significant if you screw up the perfect ending.

Take for example the American disinterest in funnies on D-day, it came close to seriously damaging the fight. If Omaha had failed, it might have badly damaged chances for success. But here's the thing, Germany was already screwed in 44, so no matter how badly the Allies might mangled D-day, the Russians were still coming. It might have changed post war Europe, but Germany was done.

The war was decided in 41-42. Everything after that was a game that was already lost, and it was just about seeing how long the Germans and the Japanese could hold out.

Hitler's incredible successes, against a foe still fighting WW1, and against politicians spending all their time trying to avoid WW1 the rerun, were in so many cases not about military genius, but about a man that knew how to use words well. But he was a useless soldier, and he actually thought otherwise based on his early easy successes based on an opponent that was too uninterested to fight all out.

His biggest victories occurred BEFORE he attacked Poland. And they all worked to inflate his ego beyond his real worth. His generals caved in and started to believe him too.

I've played too many games of what if, where it was just a cold impersonal what if devoid of anything 'human' in the picture. What if Germany attacks Russia immediately. What if Germany doesn't attack Russia at all. What if Germany refuses to attack till Germany is attacked first instead. What if Germany single mindedly attacks the the Mediterranean first. What if Germany assault France right at the beginning.

But those all require a game design, where the player is free to place all the available military resources as seen fit. Advanced Third Reich will permit this, but I can't think of any computer wargames at this moment that do. Limitations of selling a program that is fixed.

I have played games, where the player is given forces and a set up area and the placement is entirely the whim of the player. But these are usually tactical games. I'd love to try that with grand strategy. If they made SC3 like that, and made it essentially a Advanced Third Reich like experience, I'd drop 100 bucks on it in a heart beat.

I have World in Flames, nice board game, not the equal of my Advanced Third Reich (my opinion). I have also seen the once upon a time computer version of World in Flames. I presume it has evolved a lot. I'd rather they rebuild the old Third Reich pc game and make it computer Advanced Third Reich. Granted, I have no idea who owns that game, but I would just call it SC3 and shamelessly make it an A3R clone.

The thing with simulating history, is you can't copy-write history. The units were where they were.

There will always be flights of fantasy that could have never been of course. Sealion is only good for long thread arguments and landing off the shores of the USA is even sillier. I generally won't waste my time playing any that promotes that foolishness.

The Germans would not have needed to invade North America.

You are correct that Germany lost the war in 1941. But it peobably would'nt have been sufficent to capture Moscow due to the nature of this war which was a fight to the death. Even with they railroadhub gone with the fall of Moscow the war would have dragged on and Germany would have big difficultes to finish it. Even if Germany had taken Stalingrad on the march in august 1942 that would not have changed much, the wehrmacht was at the limit of it's strength, if you study the southern campaigns on the eastern front in 1943-44 it's like a tidewave unleashed. 6th army victorious or not would not have beeen able to halt that steamroller. It was just a matter of time. Reason for all that is that Germany was during ww2 beeeing outproduced by the US and USSR. Germany could not win that war of attrition even if Hitler and OKH had not made some fatal errors.

But those all require a game design, where the player is free to place all the available military resources as seen fit. Advanced Third Reich will permit this, but I can't think of any computer wargames at this moment that do. Limitations of selling a program that is fixed.

That's strange, I can think of a few, including probably the most famous one - Heart of Iron 3 as of the latest expansion has this option, plus any game that allows you to start before 1936 effectively has this option, which is a lot of games, you can even do it in Civilization 4 WW2 scenario. :)

_____________________________

"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." - G.B. Shaw